Chapter 6: The Alpha’s Protection

Logan’s POV

By the time I got to campus, classes had already started.

I walked the long way around, past the building where I knew her morning lecture was, telling myself I was only passing through. I’d just see her through the glass. That was all. I’d see that she was fine, and I’d leave.

I was almost in her hall when I heard two she-wolves, heads close together, whispering as they passed.

“Bianca and her girls went after the Canadian one. In the east corridor.”

I didn’t need to think before my body moved on its own.

I ran, shoving through a knot of students, following her scent down the hall. Beneath it, I caught something else.

Fear.

By the time I reached the east corridor, it was too late to stop what had happened. Aurora was already gone, leaving behind the scent of her tears and the sharp, unmistakable smell of Bianca’s anger.

I didn’t even realize when my wolf had pushed his way to the surface.

His eyes were mine now, gold and burning, the line between us so thin I could barely tell where he ended and I began anymore. A growl rumbled low in my chest, and the sound of it dropped the whole hallway into silence.

Bianca and her little group froze.

She coughed and pasted a soft smile on her face, as if she hadn’t been tormenting Aurora moments earlier.

“What the hell is going on here?” My voice sounded rough.

“Oh, Logan, it’s nothing.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, that smile growing sweeter, like it could fool anyone. “We were just welcoming the new girl. You know. Your sister.”

“Welcoming her?” I took a step closer. “You mean making her cry?”

Bianca’s smile faltered for half a second before she fixed it back into place. She started walking toward me slowly, flipping her hair over one shoulder, putting on the kind of show that was supposed to make a man forget he was angry.

I had to give her credit. It was almost impressive.

She was a beta wolf, and beta females were always like this. Aggressive about what they wanted, openly possessive, never quite knowing when to back off. 

Bianca had set her sights on me for as long as I could remember, picking fights with any other girl who came too close, marking her territory in a thousand little ways even though I had never given her permission to.

It had never mattered to me. My wolf had never recognized anyone, not in all my life. So I had taken her to bed once, maybe twice, and gotten bored of her by the next morning, the way I got bored of all of them.

But the Canadian was different.

My wolf had known her the second she walked through our front door. He had not stopped pacing since. I could not sleep without seeing her face. I could not breathe in our house without catching her scent in the hall and feeling my whole chest tighten around it.

And I hated her for it.

I hated every single thing she was doing to me. I hated that some bone-deep part of me knew with absolute certainty that she was not good for our pack, yet I still could not bring myself to let her go.

I could not even take her off my mind for one hour.

“Logan.” Bianca’s hand landed on my arm, soft and possessive, and her voice dropped to something she probably thought was tender. “Why are you so worked up over her? Come on.”

I looked down at her hand.

Then I looked her in the eyes.

“Don’t touch me.”

Her smile disappeared.

“You’re making a big deal out of nothing,” she muttered.

“Then you won’t mind staying away from her.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Why do you care so much about what happens to her?”

For a moment, I had no answer.

Because she was mine.

The thought came so naturally that it frightened me.

I stepped away from Bianca before my wolf could make another appearance.

“Stay away from Aurora,” I said coldly. “If I hear you’ve bothered her again, you’ll answer to me.”

I didn’t wait for her response.

I could feel every eye in that hallway following me, the whispers already starting before I had even cleared the corner.

The Pierce heir had just defended someone.

Logan Pierce, who had never stood between a single soul and their consequences, had just shown the whole school where his loyalty had gone.

Let them whisper.

I had never lifted a finger for anyone before because no one had ever been worth it.

And I did not care what story they made of this, because as far as I was concerned, the rule from this day forward was very simple.

No one was allowed to hurt her.

No one except me.

I made it halfway down the next corridor before I caught her scent again. It was much sharper now, wet with tears.

I followed it.

Telling myself I only wanted to make sure she was all right. Telling myself I only wanted to see her face, and then I would leave.

I rounded the last corner and stopped dead.

Lucas was already there.

He was crouched in front of her, one hand cupping her cheek, his thumb wiping a tear off her face with so much gentleness it did not even look like him.

She was leaning into his touch. Her eyes were closed, and her lashes were dark and wet against her skin. She was letting my brother hold her like she had been waiting for someone to do exactly that.

“I’m here,” he was saying, low and soft. “Hey. You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

I could not move.

I stood there, watching my brother do the thing I did not know how to do.

Touching her the way I would never let myself. Saying the words I could not get out of my mouth, even when I was alone in my own room at night thinking about her.

And suddenly, I was back in my father’s study that morning, hearing his voice all over again.

I found my father in his study, going over the patrol reports like he did every morning.

He looked up when I walked in, and something flickered across his face. Surprise, maybe. It had been a long time since I had come to talk to him about anything that wasn’t pack business.

“Well.” He set the papers down. “You came to me yourself. Something must really be wrong.”

I didn’t sit.

“What’s your plan for keeping Aurora safe?”

His eyes narrowed slowly.

“I didn’t realize you cared so much about your sister.”

“She’s not my sister.” It came out sharper than I meant it to. I made myself breathe. “And that’s not the point. Having a Silver Wolf in our territory is asking for war. An unmated Silver Wolf. And you’re letting her walk into a school full of strangers like it’s nothing. Is that wise?”

My father leaned back in his chair and studied me.

“What would you have me do, Logan? Lock her up like an animal? Hide her in the east wing and pretend she doesn’t exist?”

I didn’t answer.

I looked at the wall, at the window, anywhere but at him, because I didn’t have an answer that wouldn’t give me away.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed.

“Having her here is good for this pack,” he said. “You know that as well as I do. A Silver Wolf strengthens any bloodline she joins. Every Alpha within five hundred miles knows it too. That’s exactly why we can’t keep her hidden forever.”

“Father…”

He raised a hand, and I stopped.

“We’re going to find her a mate. As soon as possible.” He said it plainly, like he was discussing a trade agreement. “A mate will protect her. It settles the question before anyone can fight over it. Her mother already agrees. We’ll hold a small gathering, quietly, and choose someone suitable. She’ll be safe here, with us, and with a mate at her side.”

A mate.

The word landed somewhere in my chest and turned to fire.

It was going to be over my dead, rotting body before I let someone claim what was mine.

“Logan?”

“Fine,” I said. My voice didn’t sound like mine. “Whatever you think is best.”

I left before he could see my face.

I made it halfway down the hall before I had to stop and press my hand flat against the wall.

A mate.

Someone chosen for her. Someone who’d stand beside her at gatherings, put a mark on her neck, take her home.

My wolf was clawing at the inside of me, snarling a single word over and over, and I hated how clearly I could hear it.

Ours.

It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true.

She was the disaster I’d been begging my father to send away since the day she walked through our front door, dripping rain on our floor. She was a Silver Wolf, a war waiting to happen, the worst possible thing that could have come into this house.

And I couldn’t stop thinking about her.

Ever since she’d arrived, my whole life had come apart. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t focus. My own brother wanted her now, putting his hands all over her in the hallway like she was already his, and the thought of it made me want to put my fist through something.

I felt like ripping his head off his useless body.

It would only get worse. Soon every wolf at that school would feel her allure. Soon there’d be a dozen of them sniffing around, and I’d have to watch all of it.

…..

The memory faded away, and I was standing in the corridor again, with my brother’s thumb still moving over her cheek.

He looked up.

His grey eyes met mine over the top of her head, and there was not a single expression on his face, which somehow made everything more uncomfortable.

She did not see me. Her face was still pressed into his palm.

Something in my chest broke open, and the wolf in me roared so loudly I thought my skull would split.

I turned and ran.

I did not even make it to the doors before I shoved them open with my shoulder and stumbled out into the wet grass behind the building.

My body was already changing before I had decided to let it.

My bones cracked. My breath turned to a snarl. The world dropped down low and wide around me as I hit the ground on four legs and tore off into the trees at the edge of campus.

I ran until the school was a memory.

I ran until the air burned in my lungs and the rain finally started to come down in earnest.

I ran until I could not feel her scent on me anymore.

And even then, even then, my wolf was still snarling the same word over and over inside my chest, the one word I had been pretending all morning that I had not heard him say.

Mine.